3 - Industry

Summary

I work in comedy because I've not really done anything else. I can't put up shelves and I can't garden. I have no other skills, so it's a survival technique for me.

(Henry Normal 2005)

As a stand-up comedian and writer, as well as managing director of the independent television production company Baby Cow Productions (co-established with Steve Coogan), Henry Normal has been involved in the production of series such as Human Remains (BBC2, 2000), Marion and Geoff (BBC2, 2000–3), Saxondale (BBC2, 2006–), The Mighty Boosh (BBC3, 2004–) and Gavin and Stacey (BBC3/1, 2007–). He is therefore a highly qualified and well-respected industry figure, with much experience and an impressive ability to work with new talent. Yet, in the quote above, he refers to his abilities as nothing more than a ‘survival technique’, suggesting that working in comedy only came about because of a lack of ability to do anything else. This chapter examines what it is that those who work within the sitcom industry do, as well as exploring the ways in which the industry is talked about, especially by those who work within it. It does so through detailed analysis of interviews undertaken with members of the British terrestrial television comedy industry (see appendix for full details). As will be shown, many comedy professionals refer to their work and abilities in this self-deprecating manner for, as the sitcom writer Brian Dooley put it, ‘there's a fear with comedy that if you intellectualise it too much you get away from just being funny’ (2005).